Google

OK, Google started as a search company in 1998, when Sergey Brin and Larry Page were doctoral students at Stanford. And fifteen years later? Google is a verb. That's how ingrained it's become into our lexicon, as well as into our lives. If you want to know something, you "Google" it.

Of course, Google is so much more now. It's an advertising company (which still provides the bulk of its revenue). It's a video-hosting company, with YouTube. It's a social network, with Google+. It's a mobile company, with Android. It's leading the wearables revolution with Google Glass and Android Wear. Google's making inroads into enterprise with its web-based infrastructures, to the point where municipal governments and private businesses alike are ditching the server racks for the cloud. It's seeking to change the way we use computers with its not-quite-a-thin-client Chromebooks.

And that was just the first 15 years.

Where will Google go next? That's a question many of us can't wait to see answered. And, understandably, it's a question many are wary of. Is Google too big? Is it too powerful? Does it know too much? Is it doing the right things for the right reasons? Or is it just trying to become as rich and powerful as it possibly can? Those are all fair questions, and ones that Google should ask itself, and ones that we as its customers should continue to it.

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Speaking on Google's Q2 2015 earnings call (broadcast on YouTube, as you'd expect), new CFO Ruth Porat dropped some new numbers about how YouTube is growing. Total watch time on YouTube is up 60 percent from this time last year, the strongest growth rate Google has seen in two years. Most...

A French regulatory authority is asking Google to remove search results delisted from the "right to be forgotten" ruling globally or face sanctions.
Google started delisting search results through the "right to be forgotten" ruling enacted in the EU last year, but the search giant limited the...

Speaking in the Google Q1 2015 earnings call, CFO Patrick Pichette indicated Nexus revenues declined this quarter.
Revenues from the Play Store (and now Google Store) are such a small portion of Google's business that they're clumped into an "other revenues" category each quarter, but that doesn...

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Microsoft has scored a victory against Google in the courts. Redmond won an appeals court ruling that could lower the rates numerous electronics makers pay to license technology for smartphones and personal computers. The appeals court in San Francisco upheld a $14.5 million jury verdict against...

Last month, French privacy watchdog CNIL ordered Google to delist "right to be forgotten" requests globally and not just from Google's European properties. Google has now issued a blog post stating that it would not comply with the French regulator's demands:
While the right to be forgotten...

An email has emerged that seems to show the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) discussing a media campaign against Google with lawyers in the office of Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood. Google, which was under investigation by Hood, has been trying to discover how that...

Google has bought yet another small tech company. It revealed that it has acquired the Palo Alto, California-based Pixate, which was formed in 2012. Pixate creates tools for developers so they can make quicker and easier prototypes for mobile apps.
While the specific terms of the deal were not...

Speaking on Google's Q2 2015 earnings call (broadcast on YouTube, as you'd expect), new CFO Ruth Porat dropped some new numbers about how YouTube is growing. Total watch time on YouTube is up 60 percent from this time last year, the strongest growth rate Google has seen in two years. Most...

Google has just announced its Q2 2015 earnings, showing strong growth in revenues and net income for the quarter compared to last year. Total revenues for the quarter were $17.7 billion, up from $15.9 billion in 2014, and net income was $3.93 billion, up from $3.35 billion. Those numbers are...

New data shows that around 95 percent of Google's right to be forgotten requests come from members of the general public, with less than 5 percent coming from criminals, politicians, and other public figures. To date, there have been nearly 220,000 individual requests made to Google, most of them...

BlackBerry and Google have announced a new, enterprise-focused partnership. The two companies are working together to marry BlackBerry's BES12 enterprise device deployment service and new security features in Android 5.0 Lollipop for increased mobile security, better device management, and easier...

Google is experimenting with a new carpooling service, working with its mapping subsidiary Waze in a limited test. The company has confirmed that the service, called RideWith, will launch in Tel Aviv, Israel this week.
While the service has similarities to features offered by other ride-...

After launching the first generation of Android One devices in India last year, Google is set to unveil a new handset made in collaboration with local manufacturer Lava Mobiles. ET Tech states that the device will be retailing for ₹12,000 ($187), double the price of the first-generation phones....

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